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entitled 'Defense Management: Assessment Should Be Done to Clarify
Defense Prisoner of War/Missing Personnel Office Personnel and Funding
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August 25, 2005:
The Honorable John Warner:
Chairman:
The Honorable Carl Levin:
Ranking Minority Member:
Committee on Armed Services:
United States Senate:
The Honorable Duncan L. Hunter:
Chairman:
The Honorable Ike Skelton:
Ranking Minority Member:
Committee on Armed Services:
House of Representatives:
Subject: Defense Management: Assessment Should Be Done to Clarify
Defense Prisoner of War/Missing Personnel Office Personnel and Funding
Needs:
In response to congressional concerns about the Department of Defense's
(DOD) performance in accounting for missing personnel, DOD established
the Defense Prisoner of War/Missing in Action Office in July 1993. This
office is now called the Defense Prisoner of War/Missing Personnel
Office (DPMO). DPMO's original mission was to provide centralized
management of prisoner of war/missing in action affairs throughout DOD,
and the office initially focused on missing service personnel from the
Vietnam War and, to a lesser extent, incidents during the Cold War.
Since its inception, Congress and DOD have expanded DPMO's mission and
responsibilities.
Concerned about the level of DPMO's resources, Congress in 2002
directed the Secretary of Defense to ensure that DPMO was provided with
sufficient military and civilian personnel and funding to enable the
office to fully perform its mission.[Footnote 1] Specifically, Congress
established minimum levels of resources for DPMO, providing that the
military and civilian personnel levels, as well as funding, would be
not less than requested in "the President's budget for fiscal year
2003." On the basis of this congressional direction, DOD concluded that
these minimum levels were: 46 military and 69 civilian personnel and
$15.974 million in operation and maintenance (O&M) funding. [Footnote
2] We used these minimum levels in our analysis.
The fiscal year 2005 National Defense Authorization Act[Footnote 3]
required that we review the missions, staffing, and funding of DPMO. As
we discussed with your offices, our objectives were to (1) identify
changes in DPMO's mission from the inception of the office to the
present; (2) compare DPMO personnel and funding requests with actual
staffing and funding levels from inception through fiscal year 2004,
and determine whether the actual levels for fiscal years 2003 and 2004
were consistent with the minimum levels established by law; and (3)
assess the extent to which DOD has evaluated any need for adjustment in
personnel and/or funding levels, given changes in DPMO's mission. In
May 2005, we provided your offices with information summarizing our
observations in a briefing format. This letter summarizes and updates
the information in the briefing (see enclosure I).
To perform our work, we assessed DOD directives and federal laws that
either assigned missions to DOD that were later delegated to DPMO, or
assigned missions directly to DPMO. We conducted interviews with DPMO
officials and other officials in DOD components that also have
responsibility for personnel accounting, recovery, and/or budgetary
issues. We analyzed staffing data and budget materials from the
President's budget requests, as well as the Future Years' Defense
Program and other DOD sources, and we determined that the reliability
of these data was sufficient for our purposes. We performed our work
from January 2005 through June 2005 in accordance with generally
accepted government auditing standards. Further details about our scope
and methodology are provided at the end of this report.
Results in Brief:
Since its inception, DPMO's mission has expanded from initially
accounting primarily for missing personnel from the Vietnam War era to
accounting for missing personnel from past and current conflicts.
Furthermore, in addition to performing its accounting function, DPMO
has also become DOD's principal policy and oversight office for the
rescue and return of live personnel to friendly control - that is,
recovery. As of July 2005, DOD is revising DPMO's charter, which
codifies DPMO's roles and missions.
After an initial consolidation period immediately following DPMO's
inception, total personnel and current-dollar funding requests and
actual levels have increased slightly. The total number of civilians in
DPMO has declined, reflecting the overall DOD downsizing, with little
difference between requested and actual numbers, whereas the number of
military personnel working in DPMO has exhibited more fluctuation, with
varying differences between requested and actual numbers. However,
since fiscal year 2003, actual civilian and military personnel totals
have not met the congressionally directed minimums. Actual civilian
totals in fiscal years 2003 and 2004 were about 6 percent below the 69
minimum personnel--65 in both years. Actual military personnel totals
in fiscal years 2003 and 2004 were 30 percent or more below the 46
minimum personnel--32 and 29, respectively. Between fiscal years 1996
and 2005, DPMO funding increased in both constant and current dollar
terms, and a close balance was kept between requested and actual
funding. Operations and Maintenance (O&M) funding (which pays civilian
salaries and other expenses) was similar in both requested and actual
amounts, and it offset fluctuations in military personnel funding.
Since fiscal year 1994, DPMO's O&M requested and actual funding levels
increased, in current dollar terms. Except for fiscal year 2003, DPMO's
funding has not met the congressionally directed minimum levels. In
fiscal years 2004 and 2005, DOD requested and received slightly less
than the congressionally directed minimum of $15.974 million--$174,000
(about 1 percent) and $10,000 (about .06 percent) respectively.
The extent to which there is any need for adjustments in personnel or
funding levels, given changes in DPMO's mission, cannot be determined
because DPMO has not been subjected to a formal needs assessment since
1998. Until DPMO's charter is finalized and an assessment is performed,
neither Congress nor the Secretary of Defense will have sufficient
information to determine what the appropriate personnel and funding
levels for the office should be.
We are making recommendations to improve DOD's ability to determine
what resources are needed for DPMO and how they can best be allocated.
DOD provided written comments on a draft of this report and concurred
with each of our recommendations. DOD also provided technical comments
on the report and we made changes where appropriate.
Background:
In 1993, DOD established DPMO by combining four separate offices within
DOD. The personnel and funding resources of the four offices
transferred to DPMO; however, many of the people did not transfer with
their positions. Since its creation in 1993, DPMO has been headed by a
Director, who also serves as a Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense in
the office of the Assistant Secretary of Defense for International
Security Affairs. The Assistant Secretary, in turn, reports to the
Under Secretary of Defense for Policy.
DPMO's functions are divided between accounting and recovery missions.
With respect to a person in a missing status, accounting takes place
when (1) the person is returned to United States control alive, (2) the
remains of the person are recovered and are identified through visual
or forensic means, or (3) credible evidence exists to support another
determination of the person's status.[Footnote 4] Recovery refers to
actions taken to rescue or extract personnel for return to friendly
control.[Footnote 5]
Other DOD components and organizations also have roles in accounting
and/or recovery. The military services and the office of the Under
Secretary of Defense (Personnel and Readiness) provide casualty and
family support, handle mortuary and funeral issues, and maintain
personnel casualty databases. The Joint Prisoner of War/Missing in
Action Accounting Command, which is subordinate to U.S. Pacific
Command, also focuses on accounting issues. Teams from this command
also conduct operations to recover and identify personal remains.
Finally, the Joint Personnel Recovery Agency, which is subordinate to
the U.S. Joint Forces Command, advises the military on personnel
recovery matters such as training, planning, intelligence, and
operations; and coordinates personnel recovery issues throughout DOD
and other government agencies.
DPMO's Mission Has Expanded:
DPMO's roles and missions have expanded since the office was
established in July 1993, although there is no single, up-to-date
document that enumerates and describes them. DPMO responsibilities are
delineated in 10 DOD directives and instructions, not including the
original charter. Mission growth has occurred incrementally, with DOD
missions having been added by legislation and delegated to DPMO by the
Secretary of Defense, without corresponding revisions having been made
to the overall mission statement or charter directive. As of August
2005, DOD is revising DPMO's charter, which codifies DPMO's roles and
missions as currently delineated. In commenting on a draft of this
report, DOD stated that the charter directive should be published later
this summer.
DPMO's original missions were set out in its charter directive. The
office originally had several main responsibilities, including
participating in negotiations with foreign governments in efforts to
account for missing American servicemembers and providing
representation to U.S. government forums; assembling and analyzing
information, and maintaining databases on U.S. military or civilians
who are or were POW/MIAs; declassifying documents in accordance with
the law and communicating with affected families; and providing a
statement of intelligence collection requirements to the Defense
Intelligence Agency. Over time, due to a series of laws and DOD
directives and instructions, DPMO's missions gradually expanded. In
1994, Congress directed DOD to establish liaisons with family members
of unaccounted-for Korean War and Cold War personnel.[Footnote 6] In
1996, Congress further directed DOD to establish an office to have
responsibility for DOD policy on both accounting for and recovery of
missing persons.[Footnote 7] That year Congress also expanded the scope
of personnel considered covered to include DOD contractors.
During 1996, the Secretary of Defense issued two messages that directed
DPMO to assume the new missions identified by Congress. An additional
series of DOD Directives and Instructions that further delineated
DPMO's responsibilities was issued between 1997 and 2003. By 2003,
these included: setting personnel recovery,[Footnote 8]
repatriation,[Footnote 9] and isolated personnel training[Footnote 10]
policy; conducting interagency coordination on all matters concerning
covered persons;[Footnote 11] and organizing and leading the DOD
response cell established to manage recovery of missing
personnel.[Footnote 12] One of these instructions also designated DPMO
as the central point of contact in the Office of the Secretary of
Defense for training and education measures necessary to support the
Code of Conduct--the code outlining the expected behavior for captured
military personnel.[Footnote 13] Once the DOD directives and
instructions were completed, DPMO undertook an effort to update its
original charter to reflect its designated missions. DPMO's original
emphasis was accounting for personnel who were still missing from the
Vietnam War era, which gave the staff a caseload at that time of about
2,000. In contrast, the current accounting caseload, which includes
personnel missing from past and current conflicts, is about 88,000.
Two recent documents have implications for further expanding DPMO's
mission. First, DPMO's strategic plan, issued in January 2005,
specified a goal of implementing an organizational structure that would
unify government missing personnel accounting efforts. DPMO officials
have proposed that their office lead the unification efforts, but
without necessarily changing the organizational structure. The second
document, which was still in draft form as of August 2005, would update
DPMO's charter directive. Consistent with the goal in the strategic
plan, the initial version that we reviewed would have given the office
control over the entire process of recovery of personnel missing as the
result of hostile action, designate DPMO as the single point of contact
with other parts of the U.S. and foreign governments on all accounting
matters, and assign DPMO the leading role in family outreach. Reactions
to early versions of the draft were mixed, with some organizations
expressing concern that DPMO would assume more of an operational role
than it has previously played, particularly in the areas of family
outreach and live recovery. A senior DOD official told us that all DOD
stakeholders need to reach a common understanding of the extent of
DPMO's operational responsibilities and authorities before the document
can be finalized. At the time this report was issued, the charter
directive had not been finalized, but DOD noted the directive should be
published later this summer. DOD also noted that the latest draft does
not expand DPMO's roles beyond those it is currently performing and has
been revised to show DPMO as the "primary DOD representative and point
of contact" rather than the "single point of contact" on all accounting
matters.
DOD Has Not Met Congressionally Directed Personnel and Funding Levels:
After an initial consolidation period immediately following DPMO's
inception, total personnel and current-dollar funding requests and
actual levels have increased slightly. Civilian requested and actual
personnel numbers have declined while military personnel numbers have
increased. In fiscal years 2003 and 2004, civilian and military actual
levels did not meet the congressionally directed minimum levels. O&M
funding has slightly increased since inception, but it missed the
minimum level in fiscal years 2004 and 2005 by $174,000 (about 1
percent) and $10,000 (about .06 percent) respectively.
Personnel:
Overall, after an initial consolidation period immediately following
DPMO's inception, total personnel levels have increased slightly from
84 in 1995 to 94 in fiscal year 2004. DPMO's requested civilian
personnel total fell steadily from 1994 through 2001, consistent with
overall DOD downsizing, and since then has stabilized at 69 requested
personnel. Throughout these years, most of the requested positions were
filled.[Footnote 14] In fiscal years 2003 and 2004, DPMO's actual
civilian personnel level did not meet the congressionally directed
minimum of 69 personnel. In both fiscal years, the actual number was
65, about 6 percent less. According to a DPMO official, the office
tries to stay at the 69-person level; however, retirements, hiring
actions, transfers, and other personnel issues result in fluctuations
in the actual number of civilian personnel in DPMO at any one time.
DPMO officials said that they plan to request an increase to 114
civilian positions after fiscal year 2006 on a basis of 4 additional
positions per year. After they complete development of the strategic
plan tasks and subtasks and resource estimates, they will refine their
projections and submit requirements for future funding.
The number of military personnel requested, on the other hand, has
fluctuated considerably over time because of confusion within the
department as to whether temporary positions assigned to DPMO should be
included in the number requested. Specifically, while DPMO had 19
permanent military positions after the initial consolidation period, it
also had 27 additional military positions that were temporary.[Footnote
15] These temporary positions have been included in the number of
positions officially requested in some years, but excluded in others.
As a result, there is little correlation between the number requested
and the actual number of military personnel positions.
Specifically, in fiscal year 2003, the year that Congress established
the minimum number of military personnel for DPMO, DOD included the 19
permanent positions but did not include the 27 temporary positions in
data that it sent to the Office of Management and Budget for inclusion
in the President's budget request. However, the 19 positions were
included in the more detailed budget justification materials that are
submitted by DOD to Congress. As a result, the Office of the
Comptroller within the Office of the Secretary of Defense initially
thought the congressionally directed number was 19, while DPMO believed
it to be 46.
In an April 2004 memorandum, the Deputy Secretary of Defense stated
that the total number of military personnel positions in DPMO should be
46. While the number of positions requested has remained at 46 since
that time, the actual total has been lower than the congressionally
directed minimum of 46 in both fiscal years 2003 (32 actual, about 30
percent below) and 2004 (29 actual, about 37 percent below). The
military services are responsible for providing personnel to fill these
positions and have not always provided the full complement of 46
servicemembers to fill DPMO's positions. According to DOD, the
positions have not always been filled because of competing priorities,
such as the global war on terrorism. In commenting on a draft of this
report, DOD stated that, although DPMO's military personnel positions
are not currently filled at the congressionally directed minimum, DPMO
continues to meet its mission successfully.
Funding:
DPMO's O&M funding requests, which pay chiefly for civilian salaries,
travel, and facilities, have increased slightly in current dollars
since fiscal year 1994, the first year for which some data were
available. The actual amounts received have closely followed the
requests. It should be noted that DPMO funding requests included in the
President's Budgets for fiscal years 2004 and 2005 were slightly lower
than the $15.974 million congressionally directed minimum for O&M,
$174,000 and $10,000, respectively. DPMO officials stated they did not
know why this occurred. In commenting on a draft of this report, DOD
stated that, although the FY 2004 and FY 2005 funding was slightly less
than the congressionally directed minimum, it completely funded the
DPMO mission requirement.
DPMO has no control over military personnel funding, which is
appropriated to the services; in any event, there is no legislated
minimum dollar requirement for military personnel funding. We were able
to obtain some aggregated data from DOD that allowed us to compare the
military personnel funding that would support DPMO's number of military
personnel positions. Because DOD did not have specific data, we were
unable to trace military personnel funding for fiscal years prior to
1996 (when the first unified DPMO budget was presented), but we found
that military personnel requests and actual amounts have fluctuated
since that year. For example, the actual amounts have ranged from a low
of $1.17 million in fiscal year 1996 to a high of $3.31 million in
fiscal year 1997.
DPMO Lacks a Recent Needs Assessment:
Congress has stated that government organizations should define their
mission, measure performance, and use performance information to self
correct.[Footnote 16] Without such a roadmap, agencies can find it
difficult to make appropriate resource decisions, especially important
in a time of overall resource decline.[Footnote 17] With regard to
DPMO, Congress specifically required that the Secretary of Defense
ensure that the office has adequate resources to accomplish its mission
and established the minimum personnel and funding levels discussed
above.
DPMO has not been subject to a comprehensive needs assessment since
1998. That assessment, done by the Office of the Secretary of Defense,
evaluated each directorate and recommended personnel levels for each;
however, while the study acknowledged the need for more resources, it
recognized the constrained DOD fiscal environment and recommended that
DPMO make better use of the personnel and funding that were already
available. However, the study did not link its survey of DPMO's
activities to a roles-and-missions baseline, such as an existing
strategic plan. Other studies have analyzed aspects of DPMO's mission
without providing a systematic evaluation of what staff or budgetary
resources are needed to accomplish the mission. For example, a study
done by the Institute for Defense Analyses (IDA) and published in 2004
considered only selected aspects of DPMO's activities and recommended
that DPMO add personnel to work on recovery aspects of its mission
without considering how this would affect other DPMO roles and
responsibilities. In its written comments on our draft report, DOD
noted that the IDA study linked the need for additional DPMO resources
to issuance of a National Security Presidential Directive, which has
not yet been issued. The Under Secretary of Defense (Comptroller)
Office of Program Analysis and Evaluation recommended in 2003 that a
comprehensive study be undertaken, but its recommendation was not
approved by DOD management on the grounds that legislation had already
established a floor level of personnel and funding, and therefore a
study would be redundant.
While DPMO does have a new strategic plan that includes a mission
statement, the office has not taken three key steps that constitute the
core of output-based performance management: define all desired
outcomes, establish metrics to measure performance, and use performance
information to make adjustments and link resources to performance
goals. For example, DPMO has not defined metrics to measure its
performance, and, since there are no metrics to measure performance,
DPMO has insufficient information on performance. Within DPMO, budget
requests are made when division directors argue for their particular
initiatives before a management panel; however, the panel does not link
its resource decisions to a strategic plan.
Conclusions:
DOD has not clarified the precise scope of DPMO's roles and missions.
Moreover, the recently issued strategic plan lacks key elements, such
as performance metrics and linkages between resources and performance
goals. As a result, neither the Secretary of Defense nor the Congress
have sufficient knowledge about how DPMO intends to accomplish its
current missions or, if it is assigned new missions, how the office
intends to apportion its resources. Until a formal needs assessment for
DPMO's workload is conducted, Congress and DOD cannot make informed
decisions about what level of resources to assign to DPMO or encourage
it to assume additional responsibilities, nor can the Secretary of
Defense fulfill his statutory responsibility to ensure that DPMO has
adequate resources.
Recommendations for Executive Action:
We are recommending that the Secretary of Defense direct the Under
Secretary of Defense for Policy to (1) determine the scope of DPMO's
missions and responsibilities, and revise DPMO's charter accordingly;
(2) based on the results of this determination, undertake a formal
needs assessment of DPMO's workload to determine both what resources
are needed and how they can best be allocated among the various mission
areas, taking into account how DPMO fits within the overall spectrum of
DOD organizations that have accounting or recovery missions; and (3)
incorporate that information into a revised strategic plan that links
goals and objectives to performance metrics and resource needs.
Scope and Methodology:
To identify changes in DPMO's mission from the inception of the office
to the present, we interviewed DPMO officials; service representatives
in the offices of headquarters, Department of the Army, Washington,
D.C.; The Army Adjutant General, Alexandria, Virginia; and officials
from the Office of the Under Secretary of Defense for Personnel and
Readiness, Washington, D.C.; the Office of the Under Secretary of
Defense for Policy; and the Joint Staff (J-5), Washington, D.C. We also
conducted telephone interviews with the Joint POW/MIA Accounting
Command, Honolulu, Hawaii; Air Force Personnel Center, Randolph Air
Force Base, Texas; and Navy Personnel Command, Millington, Tennessee.
To compare DPMO personnel and funding requests with actual personnel
and funding levels since DPMO's inception, we interviewed officials in
the Office of the Under Secretary of Defense (Comptroller), Program
Analysis and Evaluation and Program and Financial Control; Washington
Headquarters Services; and the Directorate for Administration and
Management. We also reviewed personnel and budget data from the Defense
Manpower Data Center, Future Years' Defense Program (FYDP), Defense
Manpower Requirements reports, and DOD Program Budget Decisions and
Program Decision Memoranda; annual President's budget requests; and
Congressional Budget Presentation justification materials. For purposes
of assessing actual personnel levels, we used end-strength data - that
is, the number of personnel who were on board as of September 30 of
each year, which is the last day of the fiscal year. We encountered
discrepancies in the data when comparing different sources' information
for both civilian and military actual (on-board) personnel, and so
although our chart is correct to the extent possible using official DOD
sources, we cannot be sure that each data point represents the exact
end-strength for each year. However, any errors are modest, given the
low total numbers involved. To assess funding levels for military
personnel, we used FYDP data. This database provides information that
is calculated according to the number of personnel and whether they are
officers or enlisted, rather than by adding up the compensation of each
individual who occupied a particular position for all or part of the
year. We determined that the reliability of these data was sufficient
for our purposes.
To assess the extent to which DOD has evaluated any need for adjustment
in staffing or funding levels given changes in DPMO's mission, we
interviewed officials at DPMO, Office of the Under Secretary of Defense
(Comptroller), Program Analysis and Evaluation, and the Research and
Studies Office within the office of the Under Secretary of Defense for
Policy. We obtained and analyzed reports on DPMO's structure, staffing,
and resource needs. We reviewed reports that were prepared within DOD,
such as the Directorate for Administration and Management's 1998
staffing study and Army Manpower Analysis Agency's 1999 study, and
external reports, such as the Institute for Defense Analyses' 2004
report on creating a personnel recovery architecture.
We performed our work from January 2005 through June 2005 in accordance
with generally accepted government auditing standards.
Agency Comments and Our Evaluation:
DOD provided written comments on a draft of this report and concurred
with each of our recommendations.
With regard to our first recommendation that DOD determine the scope of
DPMO's mission and responsibilities and revise DPMO's charter
accordingly, DOD stated that a revised charter directive reflecting
DPMO's responsibilities and functions should be published later this
summer.
With regard to our second recommendation that DOD undertake a formal
needs assessment of DPMO's workload to determine what resources are
needed and how they should be allocated, DOD stated that DPMO has
contracted with the Institute for Defense Analyses to develop an
overall organizational plan for the personnel accounting mission that
unifies DOD's personnel accounting efforts. DOD also stated that this
study would not be completed until September 30, 2006 and any changes
"would not be implemented until after it is reviewed, changes proposed
and decisions implemented, a time-consuming process. Consequently, DOD
will weigh the costs and benefits of conducting a needs assessment now
versus waiting until after the community is reorganized." We believe
that, given DOD's statement that the directive outlining DPMO's
responsibilities and functions should be published later this summer,
DOD has sufficient basis for conducting a needs assessment in the near
term. We note that DPMO has not been subject to a comprehensive
assessment of its workload and resources in its 12 years of existence.
Should the ongoing study result in changes affecting DPMO, DOD could
then reexamine DPMO's needs and make adjustments accordingly.
With regard to our third recommendation that, after a formal needs
assessment is done, DOD revise DPMO's strategic plan to link goals and
objectives to performance metrics and resource needs, DOD stated that
DPMO is currently developing an implementation plan that would link the
strategic plan's goals and objectives to performance metrics and
resource expenditures. We continue to believe that a formal needs
assessment must be done to determine DPMO's resource requirements,
based on DPMO's stated mission and responsibilities in the charter
directive being finalized, before this information can be linked in any
meaningful way to the goals and objectives in a strategic plan.
DOD also provided technical comments on the report and we made changes
where appropriate. We have reprinted DOD's comments in enclosure II.
Should you or your staff have any further questions, please contact me
at (202) 512-9619. Contact points for our Offices of Congressional
Relations and Public Affairs may be found on the last page of this
report. Key contributors to this report were Ann Borseth, Jonathan
Clark, Sally Newman, Paul Newton, Maria-Alaina Rambus, Cheryl Weissman,
John Van Schaik, and R.K. Wild.
Signed by:
Sharon L. Pickup:
Director, Defense Capabilities and Management:
Enclosures:
Enclosure I: Observations: Defense Prisoner of War/Missing Personnel
Office (DPMO):
Briefing to Senate and House Armed Services Committees:
Mandate and GAO Objectives:
PL 108-375, Ronald W. Reagan National Defense Authorization Act for
Fiscal Year 2005, requires GAO to assess DPMO's mission, personnel, and
funding.
GAO's objectives are to:
* Identify changes in DPMO's mission from the inception of the office
in 1993 to the present;
* Compare DPMO personnel and funding requests with actual personnel and
funding levels since inception, and whether actual levels met
congressional minimum levels; and:
* Assess the extent to which DOD has evaluated any need for adjustment
in personnel and/or funding levels given changes in DPMO's mission.
Observations:
DPMO was originally established to account for missing personnel from
Vietnam and, to a lesser extent, the Cold War. However, the mission has
expanded to include accounting for missing personnel from past
conflicts as well as becoming DOD's principal policy and oversight
office for personnel recovery.
Total personnel and current-dollar funding requests and actual levels
have increased slightly since DPMO's inception.
-DOD did not meet P.L. 107-314 requirement to sustain actual personnel
at the FY 2003 President's Budget level (69 civilian/46 military) in FY
2003 and FY 2004, and missed the funding target ($15,974,000) in FY
2004 and FY 2005.
DPMO has not been subject to a formal needs assessment since 1998.
DPMO's recent strategic plan set goals and objectives, but did not
quantify personnel needs. New draft directive codifies scope of DPMO's
responsibilities, but DPMO has not quantified how many staff will be
needed.
Background: Origin of DPMO:
* Established on July 16, 1993, by DOD directive.
* Four existing offices combined to create DPMO. These offices worked
to resolve cases from Russia and Southeast Asia.
* Personnel and funding transferred from component offices to DPMO.
[See PDF for image]
[End of figure]
Background: DOD Components Sharing Recovery and/or Accounting Mission:
[See PDF for image]
[End of table]
Background: Total Personnel Unaccounted For (as of July 2005):
* World War II: about 78,000:
* Korea/Cold War: more than 8,300:
* Vietnam War: more than 1,800:
* Gulf War: 3:
* Current Conflicts: (to include Colombia, OIF/OEF): 12:
Source: DPMO.
[End of table]
DPMO Mission Requirements:
[See PDF for image]
Source: GAO analysis of public laws and DOD directives/instructions.
[End of figure]
Total Personnel:
* After the initial consolidation of offices into DPMO:
- Personnel numbers requested have fluctuated over time due to civilian
downsizing and uncertainty of military positions.
- Actual total personnel numbers have increased slightly.
* P.L. 107-314 established minimum requirements for personnel for DPMO
at the level of the FY03 President's Budget request, which were set at
69 civilians and 46 military.
Civilian Personnel: Comparison of Requested and Actual Personnel
Levels:
* DPMO started with 122 positions (some vacant) in August 1993, but
many staff remained with original agencies.
* Personnel levels decreased over time due to overall DOD downsizing.
* P.L. 107-314 established personnel level of 69 civilians as a
minimum. Actual levels were about 6 percent less--65 civilians in
FY2003 and FY 2004.
* Civilian totals exclude 29 information technology support contractors
on-board since 2000 and small numbers of intermittent contractors.
[See PDF for image]
Sources: President's Budget Requests and justification books, Program
Budget Decisions, Defense Manpower Data Center SR-113 pay records.
[End of figure]
Military Personnel: Comparison of Requested and Actual Personnel
Levels:
* At inception, DPMO had few permanent military positions.
* Requests for military positions fluctuated due to uncertainty of
authorization of 27 temporary military positions.
* P.L. 107-314 established minimum requirement for military positions.
DOD confirmed congressional direction that requirement is 46.
* In fiscal years 2003 and 2004, actual levels (32 and 29 respectively)
did not meet minimum. Actual levels depend on availability of military
personnel.
[See PDF for image]
Sources: President's Budget requests and justification books, Future
Years Defense Program (FYDP).
[End of figure]
O&M Funding: Comparison of Requested and Actual Levels:
* DPMO's overall Operation and Maintenance (O&M) funding request
initially decreased, but then steadily increased, in current dollars,
from about $15.5 million in FY 1994 to almost $16 million in FY 2005.
* P.L. 107-314 requires DOD to maintain DPMO funding at least at level
of FY 2003 President's Budget ($15.974 million).
* DOD met target in FY03, but requested and received slightly less
funding in FY04 and FY05.
[See PDF for image]
Sources: President's Budget Request, Future Years Defense Program.
Actual data for FY94-95 not available.
[End of figure]
Military Personnel Funding: Comparison of Requested and Actual Levels:
* DPMO gets no military personnel funding; services pay those costs.
* Requested military personnel funding has fluctuated because of the
uncertainty of authorization of 27 temporary military positions.
* Actual military personnel costs have fluctuated due in large part to
the number of authorized positions filled.
* At times, actual is greater than requested because the 27 temporary
positions were reauthorized too late to be reflected in a request.
[See PDF for image]
Source: GAO analysis of President's Budget Request and Future Years
Defense Program. Data for 1994-1995 are unavailable.
[End of figure]
DPMO Actual Funding by Account, in Constant FY2005 Dollars:
[See PDF for image]
Source: Future Years Defense Program.
[End of figure]
DOD Evaluation of Personnel and Funding Needs:
OSD's Directorate for Administration and Management study done in 1998
acknowledged DPMO's need for more resources, but recommended that DPMO
make maximum use of existing resources.
DPMO-sponsored studies concluded that DPMO needed more resources, but
did not conduct formal needs assessments.
-Army Manpower Analysis Agency, 1999:
* Study to determine combined personnel needs if DPMO were to absorb
Army Central Identification Laboratory and Joint Task Force Full
Accounting.
* DPMO has not absorbed these organizations.
-Interagency National Personnel Recovery Architecture, 2004:
* Study was funded by Congress and conducted by Institute for Defense
Analyses.
* Recommended increasing personnel subject to issuance of new National
Security Presidential Directive.
* OSD's Office of Program Analysis and Evaluation sought unsuccessfully
in 2003 to initiate comprehensive needs assessment.
DPMO issued Strategic Plan in January 2005 that set forth goals and
objectives, but not metrics for personnel needs.
DOD is currently reviewing a draft update to the DPMO directive that
codifies its roles and missions, to include:
- Central management, policy control, and oversight of the entire
process for investigation and recovery related to personnel missing as
a result of hostile action.
* includes: repatriation/reintegration; non-conventional assisted
recovery; combat search and rescue; survival, evasion, resistance, and
escape (SERE); operational POW/missing personnel matters; isolated
personnel training and training on related matters such as Code of
Conduct; and DOD support to civil search and rescue.
DPMO has not quantified how many staff will be needed nor determined
how to allocate resources to meet these responsibilities.
[End of section]
OFFICE OF THE ASSISTANT SECRETARY OF DEFENSE: INTERNATIONAL SECURITY
AFFAIRS:
2400 DEFENSE PENTAGON:
WASHINGTON, DC 20301-2400:
August 11, 2005:
Ms. Sharon L. Pickup:
Director:
Defense Capabilities and Management: U.S. Government Accountability
Office: 441 G Street, N.W.
Washington, D.C. 20548:
Dear Ms. Pickup:
Attached is the DoD response to the GAO Draft Report, GAO Code 350632/
GAO-05-756R, "Defense Management: Assessment Should be Done to Clarify
Defense Prisoner of War/Missing Personnel Office Personnel and Funding
Needs."
The attached consists of the DoD general concurrence in the overall
recommendations, with comments on each recommendation, and comments on
the factual information in the report. These comments at Tab A are an
integral part of the DoD response.
Sincerely,
Signed by:
Mary Beth Long,
Principal Deputy:
DoD Comments on Recommendations:
RECOMMENDATION 1: The GAO recommended that the Secretary of Defense
direct the Under Secretary of Defense for Policy to determine the scope
of the Defense Prisoner of War/Missing Personnel Office (DPMO) mission
and responsibilities, and revise DPMO's charter accordingly.
DoD RESPONSE:
DoD concurs in this recommendation.
A revised draft of the DPMO charter directive has been in coordination
since January 2005. It has the concurrence of the DoD components and
the OSD Staff, only waiting for DoD General Counsel coordination. There
is broad agreement within DoD on the responsibilities and functions
reflected in the revised directive so no significant changes are expect
from the remaining coordination. The draft directive does not expand
DPMO's responsibilities beyond those it is currently performing. It
should be published later this summer.
RECOMMENDATION 2: The GAO recommended that the Secretary of Defense
direct the Under Secretary of Defense for Policy to, based on the
results of the determination in Recommendation 1, undertake a formal
needs assessment of DPMO's workload to determine both what resources
are needed and how they can best be allocated among the various mission
areas, taking into account how DPMO fits within the overall spectrum of
DoD organizations that have accounting and/or recovery missions.
DOD RESPONSE:
DoD concurs in this recommendation.
In June 2005, DPMO contracted with the Institute for Defense Analyses
(IDA) to develop an overall organizational plan for the personnel
accounting mission that unifies DoD's personnel accounting efforts.
This study includes examining the structure of the entire accounting
community; i.e. DPMO, the Joint POW/MIA Accounting Command, the Air
Force Life Sciences Equipment Laboratory, the Armed Forces DNA
Identification Laboratory, and certain personnel accounting-related
functions of the DoD Intelligence Community and Service Casualty
Offices.
The study will not be completed until 30 September 2006 when IDA
submits its findings. Any changes from the study would not be
implemented until after it is reviewed, changes proposed and decisions
implemented, a time-consuming process. Consequently, DoD will weigh the
costs and benefits of conducting a needs assessment now versus waiting
until after the community is reorganized.
RECOMMENDATION 3: The GAO recommended that the Secretary of Defense
direct the Under Secretary of Defense for Policy to incorporate that
information into a revised strategic plan that links goals and
objectives to performance metrics and resource needs.
DOD RESPONSE:
DoD concurs in this recommendation.
As reported, DPMO published its first strategic plan in January 2005.
Since then, it has developed more specific objectives and enabling
tasks to reach its goals. DPMO is currently developing an
implementation plan that links the strategic plan's goals and
objectives to performance metrics and resource expenditures. This
revised strategic plan will be submitted to Policy for review and
approval.
3. Substantive factual comments include:
* DoD leadership recognizes the importance of DPMO's mission. As noted
in the report, in April 2004, Deputy Secretary Wolfowitz directed the
DPMO military manning would be 46, making permanent the 27 temporary
billets. This will give those billets the same fill rate priority as
the other permanent billets, and an improvement in military manning is
expected.
* Since 1999, DPMO has managed its own manpower and budget resources,
maintaining its civilian work force and submitting its own budget
requests.
* In FY2003, the funding level for DPMO exceeded the congressional
minimum by $642,000, or 4% ($16.616M). The total amount funded below
congressional minimums in FY2004 and FY2005 was $184,000.
* Although the FY 2004 and FY 2005 funding was slightly less than the
congressionally directed minimum, it completely funded the DPMO mission
requirement.
For the FY2006 budget, DPMO has requested funding above the
congressional minimum.
5. Please contact me, or the primary action office, OASD/ISA, Captain
Michael Fierro, 703-697-2788, if you have further questions.
Attachments: As stated.
TAB A:
DoD Comments on Factual Information in Report GAO Code 350632/GAO-05-
756R:
Comment on Objectives of the Report: The GAO objectives stated in the
report differ from the language contained in the Congressional
legislation (Ronald W. Reagan National Defense Act for Fiscal Year 200,
Pub. L. No. 108-375, Sect 582) and the objectives stated in the
originating GAO Notification statement. The legislation states the
report shall include:
(1) a description of changes, over the period from inception of the
office to the time of the submission of the report, in the missions and
mission requirements of the office, together with a comparison of
personnel and funding requirements of the office over that period with
actual manning and funding levels over that period; and:
(2) the Comptroller General's assessment of the adequacy of current
manning and funding levels for that office in light of current mission
requirements.
The Objectives/Key Questions listed in the originating GAO notification
document mirror the legislation but the GAO report adds the statement:
"to determine whether the actual levels for fiscal years 2003 and 2004
were consistent with the minimum levels established by law."
* The legislation asks about mission, personnel and funding
"requirements" while the report uses the term "requests."
Continents with respect to the DPMO Mission, Mannin comments amplify
the report more completely:
The following:
DoD leadership recognizes the importance of DPMO's mission. As noted in
the report, in April 2004, Deputy Secretary Wolfowitz directed the DPMO
military manning would be 46, making permanent the 27 temporary
billets. This will give those billets the same fill rate priority as
the other permanent billets, and a dramatic improvement in military
manning is expected.
Since 1999, DPMO has managed its own manpower and budget resources,
maintaining its civilian work force and submitting its own budget
requests. DoD has never limited DPMO's civilian authorization at a
level below that mandated by Congress level.
* In FY2003, the funding level for DPMO exceeded the congressional
minimum by $642,000, or 4% ($16.616M). The total amount funded below
congressional minimums in FY2004 and FY2005 was $184,000.
* Although the FY 2004 and FY 2005 funding was slightly less than the
congressionally directed minimum, it completely funded the DPMO mission
requirement.
For the FY2006 budget, DPMO has requested funding above the
congressional minimum.
* At the time DPMO was established, its primary focus was accounting
for missing service personnel from the Vietnam War. Task Force Russia,
which was charged with supporting the U.S.-Russia Joint Commission on
POWs and MIAs, was dissolved to form the Defense POW/MIA Office. The US-
Russia Joint Commission accounted for losses from World War II, the
Korean War, and a number of shoot-down incidents of reconnaissance
aircraft, collectively referred to as Cold War losses. A responsibility
subsumed into the DPMO mission.
To clarify DPMO's World War II case load and responsibility for
accounting for World War II missing personnel, the legislation
(National Defense Authorization Act for FY 2000 PL 106-65, Sec. 576.
Recovery and Identification of Remains of Certain World War II
Servicemen Lost in Pacific Theater of Operations) only requires DPMO to
make every reasonable effort to search for, recover, and identify the
remains of United States servicemen lost in the Pacific theater of
operations during World War II (including in New Guinea) while engaged
in flight operations. Although the World War 11 accounting case load
required by legislation, is substantially smaller than the 78,000 cases
referenced in the report, fairness to families of any unaccounted for
servicemember compels DPMO to handle other World War II cases as
requested. This makes the potential case load 78,000.
* To support the US-Russia Joint Commission, in late-1994, DPMO formed
the Joint Commission Support Directorate (JCSD). To man the JCSD, DPMO
planners identified 27 military billets as the manpower necessary to
support the Commission's work with the former Soviet Union. Military
billets were chosen to capitalize on unique language skills (i.e.,
Russian) readily available in the Services. Because it was expected
that the Commission's work would only span three years, the billets
were authorized as temporary billets. The US-Russia Joint Commission's
work continued under Presidential endorsement, requiring JCSD's support
beyond the initial three-year manpower request. This unanticipated
manpower requirement was resolved by extending the billets another
three years. Extending the billets continued every three years until it
was obvious that the mission was enduring and a permanent manpower
solution was needed.
The principal problem with the temporary nature of the billets is that
temporary billets and permanent billets do not enjoy the same fill rate
priority and the lower priority for temporary billets caused
disruptions in DPMO's manning. Also, they were frequently authorized
too late in the budget cycle for the Services to program them into
their authorization requests. Consequently, though the billets were
eventually included in the budget, the Services did not always program
personnel to fill them.
* As slide number 11 indicates, improving military manning was on track
until 2001 when the onset of the war on terrorism created more urgent
national priorities that challenged the filling of routine, non-combat
related billets. In support of war-related priorities, the Personnel
Recovery Office in DPMO is fully manned. While the importance of DPMO's
mission is undiminished, the manpower requirements to fight two wars
compounds already difficult resource decisions for all DoD
organizations. DPMO continues to meet its mission successfully despite
the current situation.
* The DPMO Strategic Plan is an internally-generated DPMO document that
was not sent to the Policy leadership for review and approval. The
revision will be reviewed and approved by Policy.
* Updating of charter directives has been a DoD priority and DPMO's
charter directive is one of many being revised. The Director of
Administration and Management (DA&M) in OSD is responsible for
preparing charter directives for DoD, including DPMO. DA&M performs
this in conjunction with the organization being chartered and is
responsible for DoD-wide coordination.
A revised draft of the DPMO charter directive has been in coordination
since January 2005. It has the concurrence of the DoD components and
the OSD Staff, only waiting for the DoD General Counsel coordination.
There is broad agreement wating DoD on the responsibilities and
functions reflected in the revised directive so no significant changes
are expected from the remaining coordination. The draft directive does
not expand DPMO's responsibilities beyond those it is currently
performing. It should be published later this summer.
* The report says DPMO's charter directive will designate them DoD's
"single point of contact with other parts of the US and foreign
governments on all accounting matters." Subsequently, the draft charter
directive has been revised from "single point of contact" to "primary
DoD representative and point of contact" which is more accurate.
Because DPMO's military manpower consisted of both permanent and
temporary billets, some personnel at various levels of the
organizations responsible for programming the military billets were
confused over the number of military personnel to be authorized. At the
supervisory level, it was understood by 2001 to be 46 - what budget
authorizations for military billets had as a target.
* To clarify the point about the comment that the USD(C) Office of
Program Analysis and Evaluation (PA&E) recommended a comprehensive
study and DoD management denied approval, the recommendation not to
undertake the study came from the same PA&E personnel who originally
recommended the study. As stated in the report, since Congress mandated
the manpower levels for DPMO, PA&E did not consider spending money and
resources on a study to be sound.
Both the report and slide 15 state that results of two previous studies
of DPMO mission and manpower requirements (Army Manpower Analysis
Agency and IDA) concluded that DPMO needed more resources. The Army
Manpower Analysis Agency studied whether or not DPMO would need more
manpower if it were to absorb the duties of Joint Task Force Full
Accounting and the Army Central Identification Laboratory. Those
organizations joined to form the Joint POW/MIA Accounting Command
(JPAC) avoiding the need for DPMO to add billets. IDA recommended that
DPMO add two billets contingent upon implementation of a National
Security Presidential Directive (NSPD). The NSPD is still being
developed.
Comments on the briefing slides are:
- Slide 3: See above discussion on the difference between the language
of the legislation and the objectives.
- Slide 4: See above discussion about WWII case load. DPMO accounting
activities for other conflicts has been on an exceptional basis. The
first bullet should read "personnel" recovery instead of "live"
recovery. As the report states, the draft directive may "change" the
scope of responsibilities but as the draft charter directive firms up,
that does not appear to be the case.
- Slide 7: See discussion above concerning the figure for World War II
missing. As of July 14, the figure for those missing from current
conflicts figure is 12.
- Slide 9: See discussion above concerning military billets.
- Slide 11: See discussion above concerning fluctuations in filling
military billets.
- Slide 12: DoD exceeded the FY03 funding target by $642,000. Comments
above discuss the adequacy of the funding provided and the absence of
mission impact by the slight shortage in meeting the target.
- Slide 15: See discussion above regarding these studies.
The IDA study recommendation to add two personnel to DPMO was
contingent on the implementation of an NSPD that is still under
development.
- Slide 16: The second bullet presumes that the updated charter
directive will expand DPMO's roles and missions. That does not appear
to be the case.
[End of section]
FOOTNOTES
[1] Bob Stump National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2003,
Pub. L. No. 107-314, § 551(a) (2002).
[2] With respect to the minimum level for military personnel, we found
no specific number in the President's budget for fiscal year 2003.
Other supporting documents included various levels of military
personnel for the DPMO. For example, a budget justification document
submitted to Congress by DOD included 46 military personnel for DPMO,
and DOD's Future Years Defense Program submitted pursuant to 10 U.S.C.
221 indicated 19 military personnel for DPMO. The Conference Report for
the Authorization Act states that the "conferees note that the budget
request for fiscal year 2003 provides for 46 military personnel." H.R.
Conf. Rep. No. 107-772, at 648 (2002). In an April 27, 2004 memorandum,
the Deputy Secretary of Defense stated that Congress had directed that
DPMO's military manpower should be at least 46 billets.
[3] Ronald W. Reagan National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year
2005, Pub. L. No. 108-375, §582 (2004).
[4] Department of Defense (DOD) Instruction 2310.5, Accounting for
Missing Persons, section E2.1.1 (Jan. 31, 2000) (hereinafter DOD
Instruction 2310.5).
[5] Joint Chiefs of Staff, Joint Pub. 1-02, Department of Defense
Dictionary of Military and Associated Terms, (May 9, 2005).
[6] National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 1995, Pub. L.
103-337, § 1031 (1994).
[7] National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 1996, Pub. L.
104-106, § 569 (1996).
[8] DOD Instruction 2310.6, Non-Conventional Assisted Recovery in the
Department of Defense (Oct. 13, 2000).
[9] DOD Instruction 2310.4, Repatriation of Prisoners of War (POW),
Hostages, Peacetime Government Detainees, and Other Missing or Isolated
Personnel (Nov 21, 2000).
[10] DOD Instruction 1300.23, Isolated Personnel Training for DOD
Civilian and Contractors (Aug. 20, 2003).
[11] DOD Instruction 2310.5.
[12] DOD Instruction 2310.3, Personnel Recovery Response Cell (PRRC)
Procedures (Jun 6, 1997).
[13] DOD Directive 1300.7, Training and Education to Support the Code
of Conduct (CoC) (Dec. 8, 2000).
[14] As of June 2005, DPMO's 69 civilian positions were graded as
follows: GS-15, 14 positions; GS-14, 17 positions; GS-13, 22 positions;
GS-12, 6 positions; GS-11, 6 positions; GS-9, 1 position; and GS-8, 3
positions.
[15] DPMO identified the 27 temporary military positions as necessary
to provide support to the U.S.-Russia Joint Commission, which was
established in 1992 to account for and recover missing American
servicemembers in the former Soviet Union, but, over time, these
positions have evolved to support other aspects of DPMO's work.
[16] Government Performance and Results Act of 1993, Pub. L. No. 103-62
(1993); GAO, Executive Guide: Effectively Implementing the Government
Performance and Results Act, GAO/GGD-96-118 (Washington, D.C.: June 1,
1996).
[17] GAO, 21ST Century Challenges: Reexamining the Base of the Federal
Government, GAO-05-325SP (Washington, D.C.: February 2005).